


For Fire! Souls Idol Project

by The_Wizardrous_Magicman



Category: Dark Souls III, Love Live! School Idol Project
Genre: Elements of Bloodborne
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-14 02:44:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18043943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Wizardrous_Magicman/pseuds/The_Wizardrous_Magicman
Summary: Don't give up Idol, therefore try Miracles, but be wary of inattentiveness.





	1. Chapter 1

"Ah! Ready for another fantastic day!"

Honoka Kousaka, Otonokizaka graduate, stretched out her mighty yet flexile frame, before springing forth her head in pep-filled anticipation for the marvellous day to come, oh what jollities would be had.

Unfortunately, she still hadn't opened her eyes, and so failed to notice the dark grey of the stone before her.

However, being an idol is no small feat, a student body president idol less so. It leaves you full of brains and muscles. So her strong mind found a way through the problem, and her strong lungs micromanaged its actuation.

 

Bolt upright within her own coffin, she pondered:

"Where did everyone go?"

And she turned her gaze properly around for the first time, noting the unsummerly sky, the neatly hewn coffins heaped haphazardly like a knight's laundry, and the ravine trickling about 15 feet away.

"If this is a prank, it's not funny...it's too far, even for Nozomi. Okay! I'm going to get out of this coffin, and search for everyone else! And give whoever's responsible a piece of my mind!"

Hoisting off the remaining slab of stone covering her legs and dusting herself down, she found herself in some quite cosy cobalt robes, with a slightly more cerulean heater shield, a simple four-flanged mace, and something else peculiar...

"Oh, shiny!" Leaning through her legs, she picked up the odd object, a gilded handle that fluted bellishly at the end, and had a tongue of metal that she could see, quite like a bell would have. Using the Occam's Razor she pricked herself on shuffling about, she deduced it was a bell. So, she held it in the proper bell ringing form, and flicked it as hard as she could.

And she _felt_ _a quick kiss on the forehead, sheer love pouring-_ raising a hand to where the kiss was planted, she found her hand coming away sticky with blood, yet no wound was there.

Finally springing up from her position with the mace held to the belt of her raiment, the bell tucked in a pocket on the other side, and the shield strapped via over-shoulder bandolier, she furled up her bedroll.

"Ah, hot! Hot!"

Refurled it around the orange glowy rock tucked beneath it, and strapped that to her back, enjoying the diluted warmth.

"If they're around here, they might be sleeping like I was..."


	2. Chapter 2

Honoka turned to the left, noticing a similar coffin to her own. That thought freaked her out, a lot, but she repressed it out of concern for her friends.

She heaved at it to push the lid off. It did not fall. She tucked her shoulder underneath to flip it up, but it seemed to remain glued shut. Finally, she direly swung her mace upwardly with both hands to accomplish the task-and this did the trick.

An inky black spear thrust out, meeting only air from Honoka's deft pirouette, but it was only the precursor to another, more horrible form. A 10-foot clump of metal in the shape of an elongated knight uncoiled, puppeteered by the substance that comprised the spear, and with a second corpse, more feminine and clad in black leather and knives, rigidly held around its neck by yet more goo.

Honoka responsibly booked her keester away from the construct, throwing in a few zigs and zags as it used its lanky arms to crush handholds into the still-quite-intact coffin lid, and then springing towards her once it had gotten the makeshift greatsword above its head, primed to flatten her into a pancake.

By the time it had caught up, Honoka was already halfway up her boots in water, and had attracted the attention of a few cloaked zombies, also quite intent on bereaving her of her life. It didn't help any chance of the crowd diminishing that she was screaming "AAAAGH!", "OH GODS, SOMEBODY, ANYBODY, HELP ME!" and other things. None of which profane, funnily enough. Nor did this screaming slow down the slab of stone slamming down upon her, but the font approaching her certainly did, as well as making handy for vaulting over. The crash of the blade stunned the monster while the zombies were either crushed by its weapon or caught point-blank in the shattered article of stone that the weapon crashed into, much as Honoka found herself assailed by a few splinters, too.

Sharp flakes of stone had caught her left heel, tore along her right arm, and shredded all along her back including the bedroll, as well as a larger piece having knocked her down. Bleeding profusely from these spots and at heavy risk of infection due to graveyard water in her wounds, or death due to eldritch goopy tentacle knight, her thoughts turned to her friends, and how she'd never be able to help them. To her family, and how she'd never be able to see them. But mostly to herself, and how insulting it would be to fall here. She didn't need a miracle. She had already achieved miracles, through hard work, friendship, and courage. She needed to make the miracle herself again. She needed to clear away the rain, and let the sun shine once more.

"Hey! You jerk!" She goaded, fishing the bell from her pocket, and ringing it- _and flashes of gold moved along her, deploying bandages-_ "Why don't you go pick on someone your own size?!..."She cried, now swirling the bell around, gathering momentum while the knight spindled towards her once more."Instead of me?!..."Smacking the bell against her mace, it sent a roaring plume of electricity bursting from the head- _placing down the parchment, she turned away tearlessly-_ "In other words..."

The foe was now almost upon her, arms too weakened by its previous attack to use its prior weapon, and so now electing to use its co-corpse as a spiky club. Honoka just grabbed the piping hot rock now on the floor covered in damp rags, and threw it upward.

"...GO AWAY!"

Swinging at the midair gem with her radiant mace, it expanded into a beautiful corona of fiery hues, all directly blooming towards the abomination. When her eyes had recovered from such gross incandescence, all that remained was a normal-sized set of scorched black armour, four small vials-three glowing a vibrant sunny orange, one a cool icy blue-and 12 knives, only two of which looked good for close combat, the others lacking handles but bearing a double-edged leaf design.

Reluctantly slipping into the heavy torso covering after a quick once-over for sludge-she wanted to protect her modesty, but not if the armour was dangerous-she put the knives and vials on her belt and in her pocket, and decided maybe it would be better to hold off screaming until she can find someone to scream _at._ This place was either deserted or nobody wanted to show up, and her voice hurt.


	3. Chapter 3

Scrambling on damp boots and fingernails up the slope before her-she was unused to the weight of the plate yet-she made her way along the graves to the odd form of a man skewered by a sword that twisted as though to pin him down; though how such a feat did not churn away the clay earth beneath was yet beyond her grasp. As she approached the vestigial orange flecks around it went unnoticed, distracted from by a familiar curtain of blonde hair about 2 feet inland from a thick metal disc.

"Eli..!" Honoka joyfully spluttered out.

"Honoka. Yes, just the person I came here for. Hahaha..." The blonde figure arose and turned to her, revealing indeed the face of Eli Ayase protruding from a bulky, relatively busty, 6"2 form of armour and cloth.

"Eli...? You came looking for me? Doy! Of course you did! Everyone else must be looking for everyone too! But how did you know where to find me?"

"Honoka..." Eli began, an odd smirk crossing her lips. "We've all been here before. But they no longer care about before. All that matters to them is their precious duties... Which is why I've come here, to rescue you from yours. Call it some kind of love, or hatred, but I'd like to imagine I have some nostalgia for the before. So, old friend, won't you come with me to the shrine, and wait for the end? Not a single drop of blood spilled, never the horrible agony as you keep up this sham of a world, just you, me, the other sorry lot, and the stone beneath our asses." At this point, Eli lowered her smirk and touched her face, having only been made aware of the tears cascading down it through their salty taste, and continued in a strained voice:

"There's no big victory, but you'd be a long one. An old friend to take with me and Nozomi into the end... I tried convincing the others, but the only ones who made any lick of sense were Maki and Umi, even if they'll never admit to being on the same wavelength."

"Eli, I don't know where we are or what's going on, but if you know something, I'll go with you. I need answers."

"Hahaha... I came here for you so that you wouldn't get them, Honoka. To join the B-team. The shams. Embrace your cowardice, Honoka, for thou art Unkindled. Not fit to lick the boots of a Lord of Cinder, how do you expect to fare the arduous journey and bring them back when they've quite clearly given up their duties as well?"

"Eli. What is a Lord of Cinder, and what is it that you are hiding from me?" Honoka bit back, startled by Eli's lack of cooperation.

"Forget it. You won't see sense until you know, and by then you won't be in any state to pretend that everything's ok, will you? Around here, we have a fun little naming convention. I was expecting to be Reviled Eli, but instead they call me Eli the Deserter, or sometimes Crestfallen Eli. You could've been Innocent Honoka, you know. Such a beautiful name. I wonder what you'll be now, though?"A strained malicious grin scarred Eli's face, unabashedly streaming tears now. "Now that I'm going to take your first." Marching up to the confused, scared Honoka, she forcefully grabbed her wrist and dragged it to the twisted sword. As her fingers were pushed against it, it blustered a spout of ash, before a few embers pricked through the grey. Then, Eli dragged Honoka back up and marched her over to the cliff edge.

"Eli, whatever it is that you're going through, please don't do this. I-I just wanted answers because, this place is really confusing and scaring me, okay?"

"Oh no Honoka. If you want answers, there's none clearer than the ones at the bottom of this cliff. None clearer indeed. Now why don't you see what you can glean?" Eli pulled the arm of Honoka in an arc in front of her so as to stumble her against the edge, but both remained upright: "And I'll even let your murder be at the hands of a true coward!"

Stepping back to grab her shield from the ground, Eli stepped back in at the moment she released her grip on her so as to shove her off. Honoka, with the grace of someone who didn't want to fall off of a cliff, dropped on her belly to avoid such a fate. Eli, blinded by tears and rage, overextended her step and tumbled over the prone Honoka. And then a rock. Ooh, and another. And then, in the grey mist, she could no longer be seen.

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

*gasp**pant*

Honoka stared off the cliff aghast at the grey below, before being overcome by the tremendous feeling of thick, warm, dry air being pushed inside her lungs and settling there like a giant burp ballooning her ribs.

"Lucky devil... Or was that tricks?"

Honoka weightily flopped round towards the sword, and saw her would-be murderer on all fours, clutched at the ground, heaving and attempting to cry and possibly vomit.

"Yeah. Maybe...coming here wasn't the best of ideas. I thought it might help, but that could've been the hunger talking. Or it could be talking right now, hahaha..! What's it called, Honoka, when you don't know if the decisions you make are made by you? Or which you belongs to you? I thought I could help you with what I did, but feeling all those souls, all that power, ripped away... It shows me what it's like to have lost. What I was terrified of, and what I pushed you to avoid. It's not that bad, and that scares me...I'm going back now Honoka. And please, don't lose those souls to the dear Judge. They have an odd sentimentality to them. (how quaint, sentimentality at a time like this...gives me conniptions...)"

Eli managed to get up, and even sprung onto one of the many graves lining the inland before leaping to another, calling back "Follow the main road. This way is for the crestfallen only. And don't worry about casting spells or asking for miracles-the bonfire heals both body and mind, so you don't need to worry about aneurysms or muscle soreness." And with that, she leapt along the graves again, springing her way to the shrine in the distance.

"...Eli... I promise you, whatever is going on, I'll try to help however I can. And to do that, I need everyone, because there's no problem we can't defeat when we're together! So you'd better tell me everything I need to know when I get there, because I don't think we can win otherwise...."

Flopping down by the bonfire, Honoka did indeed feel better, as though the 'burp' had diffused through her bloodstream and now brought a tight meaty sensation all over, bringing new strength to her veins. The vials of pretty colours throbbed as they came closer to the bonfire, and even her chime appeared to gain the warm glow.

 

Eventually getting up after being briefly entranced by the glow and heat of the fire-for what seemed to be a late spring day, it was surprisingly warm outside, but nevertheless the hotness was bewitching in and of itself- Honoka walked on, determined to find this Judge.

"Eep!"

Two more of the paltry zombies stood facing towards one another, a third guarding them both with a crossbow that seemed to be heavily obscured in its own machinery by wheels, strings, and an ammo box on top. They hadn't noticed her yet, her being hidden behind another coffin..

"Oh, I really don't feel good about this...but they don't seem right, and they're going to try to hurt me. So I'll need too...kill...them...and to do that, I'll need a plan. If I can throw the knives at the legs of the two in front, I can charge the one at the back with my shield, hit him with my mace, then finish off the two, I'll be okay."

Honoka, with a sober silence, made her way to do so, flawlessly throwing a knife at the inside of the right leg of the one on her right, blocking a bolt trained on her face with the shield, then flinging another to pin the right foot of the one on the left, then moving in again on the one with the peculiar crossbow.

Who proceeded to fold the front half of his crossbow back, springing out a fork of five crossbow bolts that blasted away her shield, and were then dragged down her aback face and scratched uselessly on her armour before being brought up to go for another-which she stopped by angrily head-butting him, and then punching him with the chime she had unconsciously held-

_Finally, she'd landed a clean strike! The gilded hippo of a man staggered on his mighty mallet, before flopping on his belly._

And the teeth of the man pulsed gold as her fist made impact, exploding out into his brain. Honoka huffed a decidedly _pissed_ sigh, and smashed the two debilitated zombies behind her with her mace. Another brief rush of emotions that settled on weary-overwhelmed, a shot of good old-fashioned Estus, and she was off on her way towards that plaza in the distance; the one that stood between her and the shrine. Between her and her friends.

 


	5. Iudex Gundyr

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

"Oh, three more and then I'll be halfway there! No time like the present!" Honoka angrily chirped, peeping her head over her shield and ducking into it again as two bolts flew into it, then cracking a hollow over the head from the sound of his footsteps and breath, sending his rudimentary sword and shield-a rusted kitchen knife and a window literally held by the edge-to the ground. A knife thrown, then a hollow thrown, then one or ten fists thrown, and her foes were down for the count.

 

"Huh, there doesn't seem to be any more..." Honoka hedged, cautiously peering around the arch the group were guarding, before settling on the figure alone in the plaza at the foot of the stairs. Walking up to it, the form did nothing, allowing Honoka a closer look at it:

A figure of a man, a broad and burly cast iron man, with further iron plates adorning the space above his iron abs, iron plates above his iron biceps and iron arms, and an iron skirt to cover iron legs. An iron crowned helmet fused with iron face, and heavily muted blues and golds adorned him still regally, contrasting the fainty-embered twisted sword buried through his ribs. It matched with the halberd buried beside him, though-an also-twisted thing seeming to thicken and thin at regular points along the handle, fluted all up with words glowing blue up one spiral, amber the next, then the same for the next two spirals, and with a long blade that didn't bloat that far at all from the handle, but recurved into a slight hook above it, patterned with some fanciful gild work of indecipherable meaning.

 

Outside of the puddle around him, amongst the other coffins, was a particularly large one-indeed, large enough to fit the impaled figure. Approaching that, Honoka could make out a lone embossment amidst a sea of scratch and scribble: "GUNDYR, JUDGE OF ASH"

 

"Gundyr. The judge she mentioned... Huff. I'll have to fight you too? Fine." And with that, Honoka held her mace aloft, and *KLONG!* hit him over the head. And *KLONG!* again. And *KLONG!* again. Giving up on that strategy, she took a handled knife, trying to find a weak spot aside from touching the metal twisting out of his chest, only to find, even more horribly, a writhe of twisted black flaying out of the hole behind him. All inky and hungry.

"Oh...no...not this again...it's in you, too? And I thought I stood no chance of hurting you before. But this." Honoka direly clutched her chime. "This hurt the other. Its lightning. It hurt it. Maybe it can hurt you?" Holding her blade up, Honoka made to ring the bell, and scrape it along.

_*dingleingleingling*_

_No. This is a judgement of your capabilities, not mine. Meet it with pride and poise, and prove you are worthy of my favour, my might, and my experience. Now, prove your worth as my champion!_

_*dingleingleingling*_

 "Oh. I can't use it...someone is giving me these, and this is supposed to be a test. Well then! I have to meet the rules of this place if I want to see my friends. I have to fight you, with you able to fight back. And taking out that sword is the first step. If I don't, you won't let me see my friends. I've gotta do it. Gotta do it. Okay, and here...we...go!" Clasping her hands around the blunt belly of the blade, resting the sides against the four-point crossguard, she twisted her body and kicked away.

The sword clunked out, with a meaty slipping feel. It clunked again as she strained. And again. Looking back, she saw that the reason for its slow pace was not just the twisted metal having to tick through his thick meat, but that the sword was trying to slurp at the noodly dark slugs as she yanked. She kept yanking, and finally the blade reached a much smoother point, easily leaving him now. And the dark shapes, unchecked by the sword, writhed, and blasted through his flesh, and blasted great cracks through the iron. Much like weeds, splitting concrete. These tendrils of tar throbbed and pulsated through him, straining him up as he, too, heaved himself up. All clunky, heavy, and crunchy. Crunching the stone, as he stomped himself upright. Finally, he, a throbbing-fleshed gladiator, towered over her, who let the coiled sword drop in fear and sadness as he lowered his blank gaze in kind.

 

 

"Oh, you're a lot bigger than I thought... I don't suppose you'd be willing to let me go, would you?"

The metal man moved over to the candlelit doors over at the end, and gently pushed the left one open with his free arm.

"Wait, that's it? I don't need to fight you?"

Gundyr shifted his halberd so that he was holding the base with his right hand, and used it to point at the hunk of iron she'd wrestled from his chest.

"That's probably useful to me then. Okay! Thanks for your help, but I'm going to have to fight...you..." *gulp*

A graven nod, before he slammed the door shut by its edge, and the two walked back to the centre of the arena-Honoka working hard to keep pace-before respectfully bowing to one another, signify that the fight was underway.

 

The shiny, elegant end of his beautiful halberd, came whipping in a vertical cleave down on her head, which she'd thankfully managed to sidestep enough that it glanced off her armour, and embedded into the stone beneath the big puddle. Honoka took this opportunity to throw two of her knives at him, but one dinged off and the other hit the mark, but left a dissatisfying *blop* as ichor pushed it out with all the force of seeping pus.

"Mace it is then!" Honoka charged him, side ponytail flapping in the breeze as she bounded in-*crack-whumph!*-and got subsequently carried far, far away by a 20ft long pole, which then arced down in its swing to smash her into the soggy ground and cave in her armour too. In agony, sodden, and now probably drowning, Honoka quickly fumbled around and pulled out a vial of Estus, and supped its contents. Filled with the same fire from earlier, she could feel her lungs clear right up, and direly ripped away the shreds of metal threatening to be healed around, before scrambling onto her feet.

A good thing she did, as Gundyr had not been idle,and was doing his best to chase after her-and she hadn't much room left before the arena simply dropped off into a large cliff. One thing neither of them noticed, though, was the twisted sword still rolling around on the floor, _right_ in position to send Gundyr comically crash face down in the stone, as Honoka had dived aside. Now grasping her mace with both hands, Honoka wasted no time in slinging it down on his gaping back, again, and again, and again, managing to keep him down through sustained, and very heavy, blows. Each shattering the metal around the wriggling dark more and more, as they grew more and more agitated. It was just as she made to slam upon his head, sweating and at the end of her breath, that a spindly hand shot out of the mass, grasping her mace, and a toothy grin greeted her from his wound. Not the bluntest tool in the shed, she confidently booked it away. Confident, that is, that not booking it away would be an idea she hoped she wouldn't have lived to regret. The pruny, inky, cably, meteoric snake that wrapped itself over his shoulder like a man holding a yacht, seemed to agree, and slammed its ever-growing hand, and raked ever-growing nails. This had the side effect of snapping the mace.

 

"Hooray..." Honoka ironically cheered, before it yanked its way towards her, and then Gundyr lunged forwards with his polearm. She dropped to her belly to avoid the attack that would have split her gut in two, then used the recoil of the motion to get her legs beneath her, propped the daggers with handles that she had beneath the shaft of the weapon, and kicked up and to the side to shove the weapon wide, and sprinted in on him as he fell to a knee, serpent frustratingly twisted into a shoulder guard. Honoka, unfaltering, leapt into its side, scurrying up and over on her daggers, as Gundyr shifted his weapon to try and prop himself up on the tip. As Honoka finished her vault, preparing to stab him in the neck...

 

She went wide...

And got an extra strong nuzzle from a very hangry snake as a result, sending her far back, and with more damage as she skated away on the back of her armor like a hockey puck-and after more healing and pulling away, it began to resemble some kind of jacket only attached at the top- covered in blood at the seams and exposing a very vibrantly coloured belly.

Nothing indecent mind you, unless looking like you had a good crack at trying to introduce cherries to a tikka masala but couldn't find a lid for the pan, counted as indecent.

Now noticing that she had no more Estus that could heal her, she took a more cautious approach than even before, getting up quickly as she noticed Gundyr's halberd smouldering in hues of gold and green along the blue and amber colourisations that adorned its haft, as it became apparent for the cause of his drop in height.

The halberd had shortened into a great axe, which he now held considerably closer to him.

"A phase 3, hasn't this gone on long enough?" She grumped, pouting but still wary.

Gundyr made the first move, his weapon glowing again as the serpent made to grab it and tug forwards, effectively throwing its handle to extend forwards as though it were telescopic-but it still tended towards gravity as the haft traced the blade as though it were the chain of a harpoon, frozen in time. Honoka dodged this to the side, then danced under the curve the haft now offered as Gundyr swung the weapon with not only both arms, but the additional head as well. The additional power but awkward angle led to many more strikes going much wilder, Honoka still finding the grace to dance between them now that her load had been lightened, until Gundyr had settled into a motion borrowed half from rowing, half from a mezzaluna. Honoka could still flit between the strikes, but recognized that she couldn't keep it up forever. Closing the distance, she provoked him to try to lean on his weapon to shorten it again while batting her off with his giant talons. Bowing beneath the sideways swipe of his claw by shoving her knee into her armour-hole in a runner-stance, she zipped in at the critical moment. She stood on his knee, jammed a dagger into a crack in his stomach-forcing him to thrash back-then continued the run up him with a kick to the chest and a knife to the front of the neck as he toppled back to the floor, dropping the now-axe. Shifting to get some traction, she tugged the knife down the fractures in his chest armor, zigzagging left as she did so to debilitate his right arm, causing him to choke as black trickled down through his armpit. Attempting to get up still, he leaned on his big arm again, while Honoka tugged on his still-large-for-her axe as one of her weapons was embedded in him, and she needed more than a simple knife to land a strong enough blow to fell him.

So it was that Gundyr heaved himself to his legs. Only for Honoka to manage to spin the axe, skating it off the wet stone, embedding it into the back of his calf. As he fell, she tugged it back out. And rammed it in again the same way, halfway through his attempt this time. Now trying to bat at her with his claw, she skated away with the axe, while he stumbled back onto his feet using the claw. Which she interrupted by running back in with the axe, and flinging it clean through the remaining bit of calf, carrying it back into the ground. As he lay there, dyeing the water black, his monster hand, snake, and tail writhing, the two looked at one another again, Honoka preparing the axe for a final blow.

"So, did I pass the test?"

His answer was to throb his chest, as hard as he could, so that the black mass was sucked back in.

And then he lifted his finger skyward.

Nodding in feigned understanding, she managed to slam the axe down on his neck, which he had tilted to allow a cleaner stroke.

His head rolled off, and then all of his body exploded into ash and souls, though the armour stayed behind-not in any usable form though, as it had been broken mostly into shards by the time he died. These shards fell into the last place of his corpse, like a murder scene recorded in broken beer bottles, and a tuft of flame where once he stood waiting denoted a new bonfire-and blasted the sword she came for a bit, making a bit of a racket.

She picked up said sword whilst still dragging the axe with a newfound strength, and sat by the bonfire, understanding the comforts it offered included that of a sleepless rest. Wounds healed, she of course didn't need to, but she still toasted a fresh Estus. The warmth shot through her again, now seeming to dance along her flesh in rings of fire. To Gundyr, the judge! May the worthy, carry your judgment? And never waver in worth? Nevertheless...Gundyr!


End file.
